Hillstrom K., Hillstrom L.C. Vietnam war. Almanac

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Vietnam Since the War (1976-Present) 273

New Year 2000 in Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon). Reproduced by permission of AP/Wide World Photos.

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have moved past the war. Part of the reason may be that more

than half of the Vietnamese population of seventy-six million

was born after the Vietnam War ended. Many people in this

younger generation appear to be more interested in learning

English and establishing good careers than in worrying about

the past.

One project, launched in April 2000, is an attempt to

turn the most well-known landmark of the Vietnam War into

an opportunity for economic growth. It involves transforming

parts of the Ho Chi Minh Trail—the network of jungle trails

that moved troops and supplies between North and South

Vietnam—into a 1,000-mile-long national highway. Vietnam

officials predict that the highway will open up trade and

industry to the untapped mountainous western provinces. The

estimated three-year-long project is already off to a bumpy

start, however, since land mines and unexploded bombs are

peppered throughout the trail. This undertaking is one of

many initiatives to convert war “relics.” Other examples have

included turning military bases into factories.

Although Vietnam shows outward signs of prosperity

in the cities, it is clear that the government still has work to do.

Vietnam remains one of the world’s poorest nations, with an

average annual income of about $300 per person. Conditions

have not improved in the countryside, where peasants work in

rice fields as they have for generations. Medical care is limited

for the poorer segments of Vietnamese society, and disease and

hunger are common problems. While the population of Viet-

nam has grown rapidly, the nation’s farmland and natural

resources have disappeared. This means that Vietnam must

move toward an economy based on technology in the future.

But severe shortages of trained business managers and skilled

labor will make this transition difficult.

The Communist Party no longer controls every detail

of people’s lives, but the government’s economic reforms have

not been matched by wide-ranging political reforms. Viet-

namese leaders do allow students and other groups to criticize

their policies in a limited way. But they actively prevent rival

political movements from developing. Some people in Viet-

nam have access to foreign television stations on satellite

dishes. But Communist officials often censor the information

published in newspapers and magazines.

274 Vietnam War: Almanac

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In 1996, the Vietnamese government took steps to

control the people’s access to the Internet. “Hanoi is con-

cerned that the information superhighway will not only link

one of the world’s poorest nations to the economic data it

needs, but also give Internet surfers access to human rights

reports, pornography, and the many World Wide Web sites cre-

ated by overseas Vietnamese groups hostile to the govern-

ment,” Hiebert explains.

Despite such efforts to control opposition to their poli-

cies, the Communist Party still appears to be losing power in

Vietnam. The collapse of the Soviet Union helped increase

people’s doubts about the wisdom of the Communist political

system. In addition, many Vietnamese blame the government

for causing the country’s economic problems after the war. The

government continues to face problems with corruption, as

dishonest officials give the best land and jobs to their friends.

The younger generation of Vietnamese has become interested

in Western culture rather than traditional Communist ideas.

As a result, membership in the Vietnamese Communist Party

has decreased steadily over the years.

Some observers predict that the Vietnamese people

will soon begin demanding greater freedom and individual

rights. “As Vietnam’s society modernizes, receives informa-

tion, and joins the outside world, it seems likely that economic

change will beget [produce] greater participation in the Viet-

namese political process,” Frederick Z. Brown predicts in Viet-

nam Joins the World.

Sources

Chandrasekaran, Rajiv. “Highway to the Future Built on Vietnam’s Past.”

Washington Post, [Online] April 6, 2000.

DeBonis, Steven. Children of the Enemy: Oral Histories of Vietnamese

Amerasians and Their Mothers. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 1995.

Herring, George C. America’s Longest War: The United States and Vietnam,

1950–1975. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1979.

Hiebert, Murray. Chasing the Tigers: A Portrait of the New Vietnam. New

York: Kodansha International, 1996.

Isaacs, Arnold R. Vietnam Shadows: The War, Its Ghosts, and Its Legacy. Bal-

timore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997.

Vietnam Since the War (1976-Present) 275

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Karnow, Stanley. Vietnam: A History. New York: Viking Press, 1983.

Morley, James W., and Masashi Nishihara, eds. Vietnam Joins the World.

Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1997.

Young, Marilyn B. The Vietnam Wars, 1945–1990. New York: Harper-

Collins, 1991.

276 Vietnam War: Almanac

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ven after the Vietnam War ended in 1975, memories of the

conflict continued to haunt the United States. Troubled by

the U.S. defeat, the war’s terrible destruction, and its shattering

impact on national unity, the American people entered a

period of self-doubt and disillusionment. This attitude made

America’s Vietnam War veterans feel even more neglected and

isolated.

The American people continued to feel uncertain and

depressed about both themselves and their political leadership

into the 1980s. During that period, however, attitudes about

both Vietnam veterans and the U.S. war effort began to

change. Americans continued to disagree about U.S. actions

and attitudes in Vietnam, but they showed a greater willing-

ness to move on and look to the future together. Veterans,

meanwhile, finally began to receive recognition for the sacri-

fices they made in service to their country.

Nonetheless, historians agree that the wounds the

United States received in Vietnam have not completely healed,

even a quarter-century after the war’s conclusion. U.S. foreign

policy decisions continue to be shaped by memories of the

277

America Since the War

(1976–Present)

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war. In addition, the conflict still

evokes emotions of sadness, anger, and

regret in many American families and

communities.

American self-image

and Vietnam

The United States entered the

Vietnam War in the mid-1960s as a

tremendously self-confident nation.

Over the previous two decades, America

had become the most economically suc-

cessful and technologically advanced

nation in the world. Moreover, the

country was proud of its role in the

defeat of Germany and Japan in World

War II (1939–45), which was widely

viewed as a triumph of good over evil.

The memory of this great military tri-

umph—and other American military

victories throughout the nation’s his-

tory—combined with the prosperity of

the 1950s to create a feeling of opti-

mism, pride, and self-assurance in most

American communities.

In the early 1960s, all of these

factors led the United States to see itself

as both the most moral and the most

powerful nation in the world. Ameri-

cans believed that they “could not be

beaten in war—not by any nation, and

not by any combination of nations,”

notes Loren Baritz in Backfire. “We

thought that we could fight where,

when, and how we wished, without

risking failure.” The United States thus

entered the Vietnam War with the full expectation of rolling to

a quick and relatively painless victory.

But the war in Vietnam shredded America’s belief in its

military invincibility, its moral goodness, and its status as a

278 Vietnam War: Almanac

Words to Know

Cambodia Southeast Asian nation located

on the western border of South Viet-

nam. During the Vietnam War, Cam-

bodia experienced its own civil war

between its pro-U.S. government and

Communist rebels known as the

Khmer Rouge.

Khmer Rouge Communist-led rebel forces

that fought for control of Cambodia

during the Vietnam War years. The

Khmer Rouge overthrew the U.S.-

backed government of Lon Nol in

1975.

MIAs Soldiers classified as “missing in

action,” meaning that their status is

unknown to military leaders or that

their bodies have not been recovered.

Watergate A political scandal that forced

U.S. President Richard Nixon to resign

from office in 1974. In June 1972,

Republican agents associated with

Nixon’s re-election campaign broke

into the Democratic campaign head-

quarters in the Watergate Hotel in

Washington, D.C., to gather secret

information. Nixon and several mem-

bers of his administration attempted

to cover up the burglary.

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unique and special country. The nation

lost more than 58,000 soldiers and

endured great internal divisions and

turmoil over the war, only to see North

Vietnam roll to victory in 1975. North

Vietnam’s triumph intensified the feel-

ing that America had wasted thousands

of lives and billions of dollars in the

conflict. It also marked the first time in

history that the United States had been

on the losing side in a war.

A disillusioned country

In the years immediately fol-

lowing Vietnam, many Americans felt

great disappointment and anger

toward their country. They expressed

doubts about the trustworthiness of

the government, the morality of Amer-

ican institutions and society, and the

future of the nation. “The Vietnamese

War produced a profound moral crisis,

sapping worldwide faith in our own

policy and our system of life, a crisis of confidence made even

more grave by the covert pessimism [secret gloominess] of

some of our leaders,” claimed U.S. President Jimmy Carter

(1924–; president 1977–1981) in 1977.

The Vietnam War was not the only reason for these

feelings of anxiety and self-doubt. The Watergate scandal,

changing gender roles, unsettled race relations, economic

troubles, fast-changing business trends, and new standards of

conduct and taste all transformed American society during the

1960s and 1970s. Some of these developments—such as

improved opportunities and rights for women and minori-

ties—greatly improved the nation as a whole. But other

events—like the Watergate scandal and gasoline shortages—

contributed to the United States’ post-Vietnam crisis of self-

confidence. Combined with America’s nightmarish experience

in Vietnam, these changes convinced many people that the

stable and patriotic society of the pre-Vietnam era had been

lost for good.

America Since the War (1976–Present) 279

People to Know

George Bush (1924–) President of the

United States, 1989–1993; also

served as vice president under Ronald

Reagan, 1981–1989.

Jimmy Carter (1924–) President of the

United States, 1977–1981. In 1977,

he pardoned people who had resisted

the draft during the Vietnam War.

Bill Clinton (1946–) President of the

United States, 1993–2000. In 1995,

he resumed full diplomatic relations

with Vietnam.

Ronald Reagan (1911–) President of the

United States, 1981–1989.

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American veterans in the 1970s

The years immediately following the conclusion of

the war were especially difficult for American Vietnam veter-

ans. Some veterans suffered from the nagging sense that they

had let their country down. As Arnold Isaacs explains in Viet-

nam Shadows, America entered Vietnam at a time when “the

towering triumph in World War II was still the dominant

image in the imagination of most Americans—and their sol-

diers, as well. The great majority of men who fought in Viet-

nam were born between 1945 and 1953, growing up in [a

time] of postwar prosperity and national self-confidence. A

large number were certainly the sons of World War II veterans.

Virtually everything in their culture—novels, movies, family

stories, childhood games, schoolbooks, the traditional patri-

otic rhetoric [message] of Veterans Day speeches and gradua-

tions and political campaigns—conditioned young men

entering military service in the mid-1960s to think of Viet-

nam as their generation’s turn to be, as one veteran said, ‘the

280 Vietnam War: Almanac

It wasn’t until 1982 that the

Vietnam Veterans Memorial

Wall was dedicated. This

statue, by Frederick Hart,

representing the racial

makeup and the service

branches of the U.S. forces

in Vietnam was unveiled

in 1984.

Photograph by Kathleen

Marcaccio. Reproduced

by permission.

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good guys against the bad guys.’ . . . And when Vietnam

turned out to be such a different and disappointing war, the

contrast with their fathers’ experience made the disillusion-

ment even sharper.”

Many veterans also felt neglected and isolated from

their fellow Americans in the years after Vietnam (see Chapter

10, “Coming Home: Vietnam Veterans in American Society”).

They often returned home to families and communities that

offered little sympathy or understanding of their experiences.

“After an unpopular, unsuccessful, and morally confusing war,

most Americans . . . just wanted to forget it as quickly as pos-

sible,” Isaacs explains. “The veterans were an uncomfortable

reminder of a subject no one wanted to speak about, or

remember. Though the failure of American policy was surely

not the fault of the young men who were sent to do the fight-

ing, they were often made to feel as if they alone carried the

stigma [mark of disgrace] of failure and the moral burden of

violence.”

America Since the War (1976–Present) 281

Ronald Reagan helped

improve the country’s

attitude toward Vietnam

veterans by publicly

commending them for

fighting for their country.

Reproduced by permission of

the Ronald Reagan Library.

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This sense of abandonment

was made even worse by the way that

American films, television shows, and

other media portrayed Vietnam veter-

ans throughout the 1970s. Their

wartime experiences rarely were given

any serious attention. Instead, movies

and television shows typically por-

trayed them as pitiful, drug-addicted

losers or homicidal maniacs. To the

many veterans who had served their

country honorably in Vietnam despite

enormous hardships, these sorts of

characterizations seemed particularly

cruel and unfair.

Changing attitudes

toward veterans

The image of America’s Viet-

nam veterans finally began to change

in the early 1980s. One important fac-

tor in this transformation was the

increased public support that veter-

ans received from some of the

nation’s political leaders. Presidential

candidate Ronald Reagan (1911–;

president 1981–1989) declared in

1980, for example, that the effort in

Vietnam “was a noble cause . . . . We

have been shabby in our treatment of

those who returned. They fought as

well and as bravely as any Americans have ever fought in any

war. They deserve our gratitude, our respect, and our contin-

uing concern.”

Another event that changed American attitudes toward

Vietnam veterans was the Iran hostage crisis. In November

1979, militant Iranians, angered over U.S. support for Iran’s

previous government, took 66 Americans hostage. Thirteen of

the prisoners were soon released, but the remaining hostages

were held captive for 444 days. They were finally released in

282 Vietnam War: Almanac

Night Sounds in

Postwar Vietnam

In 1999, veteran and author

Philip Caputo returned to Vietnam,

where he had been a marine platoon

leader in 1965 and 1966. Writing in

National Geographic Adventure, he talks

about the vast difference between

wartime Vietnam and its postwar

atmosphere:

At two in the morning . . . I pad

outside through the courtyard gate and

down a pitch-black path. If ever I’m

going to suffer a flashback, it would be

now, but I don’t. Hearing crickets sing

and frogs chirrup near the riverbank and

in the paddies, I recall listening to those

sounds on watch [during the war];

listening for them to fall silent. When the

frogs and crickets stopped, it meant that

someone—or a whole battalion for all

you knew—was moving around out

there in the black unknown beyond your

foxhole, and you waited with every sense

alert, every nerve tensed for a burst of

gunfire, a grenade to come arcing out of

the underbrush. But now the chorus goes

on without interruption, the ceaseless

song of ordinary and peaceful night.

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